The Prison Inside a Prison
by Puru Girl
Summary: It's five years after Voldemort came to power. Most of the population have either killed themselves or been killed. Harry is haunted by his memory of Ron and Hermione. He takes up drinking to forget. Then in one night everything changed...
1. Memories and formality

The Prison Inside a Prison  
  
By  
  
Samantha Roberts  
  
A Harry Potter Fanfic Genre: Angst/ Horror/ Adventure PG-13 for: Dark themes, intoxication, gore  
It was two years since the Dark Lord, Voldemort had taken over. 23 and 30/31 monthes and days to be precise. Tomorrow was the dreaded anniversary. Harry knew something big was going to happen. Voldemort would almost certainly celebrate in some new, cruel way. Maybe muggle sport? No. That was last year. Voldemort and his followers had hung a village of muggles all at once on seventy-two old fashioned gallows. It was in the Daily Prophet.  
  
Speaking of the Daily Prophet, Harry sighed disgustedly, brandishing it over his lap with his hand. Truth be told, the whole thing had gone to the dogs. The best reporters, with the exception of one or two had been slayed by death eaters, and now the only story the remaining rookies could report on was the fresh attacks. No one wanted to hear about the war, if you could call it that (The Light had barely any army left), and people had, for the past two years, taken to depressions and suicide.  
  
Depression...  
  
Suicide.  
  
That was the way it went. First you got really depressed, sometimes so much that you could barely breathe, but couldn't tell anyone. Then you killed yourself with Avada Kadavera... like them...  
  
No, Harry thought. It's been ages now. AGES since then. Don't think about it. You only....only...  
  
Harry buried his head in his arms. Geez...why? Why had they done it? And the time in between...it was so close. And he had found her... had found her in her bedroom. He had come to visit her. She had been in a slump for weeks. And why wouldn't she have been? Her parents had been participants on the first anniversary. But he had found her...oh God, just found her lying there, her wand still there in limp fingers; fingers attatched to a very cold, sprawled out body. A dead body. A cursed body.  
  
And him... his sister had found him hanging in the basement, his body still swinging back and forth ever so slightly, ever so little, from his jump off of the chair. It had been so perfectly planned out, he realized. He knew exactly how long the rope should be to keep his feet from touching the ground so that he could escape. It was so perfect. Perfect. So well planned out you would have thought...  
  
No! Harry frantically shook his head, tears threatening to spill over his shining, green eyes. No...the memories... they were only alive because he kept them alive by thinking about them. He needed to forget, just forget about everything. Nothing was real. Nothing at all. He only made it real when he thought, and most of the times he didn't. He drank himself until he was "mentally dead". It kept the memories away. Far, far away, where his friends couldn't get him.  
  
He sank back into his chair, his face now devoid of emotion. Oh, if only people could see him now. "St. Potter" had finally lost his marbles. It was so ironic. The whole entire thing. But no one would know. No one would ever know. Just like Ron and Hermione.  
  
Harry exhaled deeply. There he went again. He was thinking about them again. It only made him feel more depressed than he already was, so why did he keep bringing them up? Oh. He knew. He always knew. It wasn't he who kept bringing them up, but they themselves. They, whose spirits had haunted him this past year. And they were coming to get him again.  
  
Relentless, he thought bitterly. They're relentless. He took a swig of the malt whiskey that stood on his coffee table. Then another. He would have downed the whole thing, had his friend Dobby not walked into the room and grabbed the bottle from him. His friend. The only friend left. But after that one died, he would join the rest in their mercilous game of cat and mouse, Harry being the mouse.  
  
Dobby snapped his fingers, the whiskey disapearing in a puff of smoke. He stared at Harry disapprovingly. "You is not drinking tonight, Sir. Dobby means no disrespect, Sir, but you is going to a ball tonight. You is needing to get ready, Sir!" He seized Harry's wrist and pulled him to his feet, with suprising strength for such a small creature. Harry stared at him blandly, trying to get his eyes focused after such a jerky movement. His glasses lay discarded on the cluttered coffee table. Why was Dobby looking at him like that? He had such pity in his eyes. Oh. He knew. He must have seen Ron and Hermione before they left out the door. Well, at least someone knew and cared.  
  
The next few minutes seemed like a blur of colors and shapes to Harry, because by the next moment he was groomed, formally clothes and apparating to Gilderoy Lockhart's mansion. It would only be a small get together, fore the Dark Lord might attack at any big events. And it was also strange how much friendlier Gilderoy was now after his memory charmed had backfired onto him in his first and final year as resident Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. He and Harry had met up again outside of Hogwarts while purchasing something (he couldn't remember) from The Leaky Cauldron.  
  
Now he acted as though a rainy day couldn't phase him, the lucky bloke. Harry envied the not-completely-there man. He wished he could still laugh at simple things, even if it meant losing his mind completely, which many people thought Gilderoy had (though never spoke of it).  
  
"Ah, Harry-ma-boy. You've come! Delightful," Gilderoy was saying to him. Or was it really him? He was laughing and chatting with Gilderoy now, amongst the formally robed crowd, but then again, it wasn't him. It was only a mask, an illusion. He had to create the illusion that he was happy. Afterall, if he let more people know, his friends would get him. And why? Because more people would want to get to know him, and more and more things would come out. Like memories...  
  
Harry smiled a lop-sided smile at Gilderoy, fore he had just told a joke. Gilderoy laughed richly and patted Harry on the back with more force then was needed. It was all a game. One big game. He was losing the game now. He was getting sidetracked from the initial mission. What was he doing here? Oh. That's right.  
  
To play the game you had to show yourself in a small public at least once or twice a month so that he could keep himself a secret from everyone. This was only a monthly bump in the road. He was still losing though. Still losing. Suddenly he felt sick. "Excuse me,"Harry said, cutting Gilderoy off in mid-story and waded through the crowd of people. More people had come than expected. There were almost fifty here. Clearly Gilderoy had a different view on what a "small get together" was.  
  
He weaved his way into the bathroom and emptied his stomach in the toilet. He didn't feel sick in the bodily sense though, just in mind and thought.  
  
BANG.  
  
Harry lifted his head up with a start. What was that? Muffled screams ripped though the door and Harry checked fearfully that the stall was locked. His friends. They had come for him. They were here and were going to get him at last!  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
END OF CHAPTER ONE 


	2. Paranoia and Clostrophobia

The Prison Inside a Prison  
  
By  
  
Samantha Roberts  
  
A Harry Potter Fanfic Genre: Angst/ Horror/ Adventure PG-13 for: Dark themes, intoxication, gore  
  
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Last Time:  
  
BANG.  
  
Harry lifted his head up with a start. What was that? Muffled screams ripped though the door and Harry checked fearfully that the stall was locked. His friends. They had come for him. They were here and were going to get him at last!  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
The volume increased. Harry looked around anxiously, not knowing what to do. He was the Boy who lived, but could he really live now that his friends had found him? Oh God, oh no! Harry started to panic. He looked around some more, twisting his head around towards the wall of the cubicle that the door should be near. Any minute now and his friends would come through that door to get him. He grabbed his whiskey bottle from the inner pocket of his robes, the one Dobby hadn't found, and lifted it up to drink, but the door flew open with a crash.  
  
He dropped the bottle on the floor and it broke. The alcohal washed over his feet and he looked at it helplessly. His friends had come. Now he had no defense.  
  
"Harry!" shouted a male voice. Ron? No.  
  
"Alohamora!"came the voice, a strangled one, a frightened one, and the door unlocked and opened.  
  
Gilderoy Lockhart. Not Ron. Gilderoy stood in the doorway of the cubicle and grabbed Harry by the wrist. "I say, man, get out of here, don't hide! The Death Eaters...oh God, they're HERE!" he yelled, but in a whispery voice. People seemed to be taking Harry by the wrist alot today. Gilderoy dragged Harry out of the cubicle and into the main part of the restroom.  
  
Gilderoy pointed his wand at a ceiling vent and it squeeked open. It was hardly big enough to fit a small child through, byt even so, Gilderoy miraculously squeezed through it. Now he was extending his hand to Harry, trying to help him up. "Grab hold!" he whispered urgently. "We'll escape through the vent."  
  
Harry looked at Gilderoy's hand as though he had never seen one before. Another escape? No, they would FIND him up there! He needed his whiskey NOW! But alas, it was still on the floor, still out of reach, still broken apart. "Harry!" Gilderoy hissed! Harry hesitated and grabbed Gilderoy's hand. With a grunt, Gilderoy pulled him up, and just in time. The door shattered into bits of wood and in came the Death Eaters, wands extended in front of them, faces covered by long black hoods.  
  
Harry and Gilderoy held they're breath. Would they find them? Harry hoped not. But maybe Ron and Hermione would help these men. That would be bad. Then they would win. Harry would lose the game.  
  
One Death Eater blasted away the stalls and laughed cruely. "It'd be pretty funny if the ministry found them still on the pot." he sniggered stupidly. Crabbe? It had to be. Then that meant his old rival Draco Malfoy would be around somewhere.  
  
"Yeah," a second one said thickly, Goyle. Harry suddenly felt sick again. He palmed his mouth nervously and closed his eyes. They were as good as dead up here. If not by the Death Eaters, then by the closing walls. Harry looked around fearfully. The walls were closing in on him. He needed air! He tried to breathe normally, but couldn't get the normal pattern going. He was going to die in this little space, and no one would ever know. "I need out!" he said in a choked whisper. "I need air!" He made up his mind... and started crawling quickly out of the vent.  
  
Gilderoy grabbed him by the waist and pulled him back, but Harry was strong and could hold his own in this battle. Then again, so could Gilderoy. "Harry!" Gilderoy grunted. "What are you doing?!"  
  
Harry started kicking the walls, yelling at the top of his lungs. Out! Out! Air! Air! Why wouldn't Gilderoy let him out? Oh NO! His friends must have gotten him on their side! Gilderoy trying to suffocate him! He turned around and punched Gilderoy in the nose, not even thinking of using his wand, but Gilderoy still held on tightly.  
  
The voices underneath them had long since stopped. They must have left. Thank god! Harry growled and reached for the hole in the vent that they had originally crawled through. Air! He was dying! He grabbed hold of the panel and tried to drag himself towards it.  
  
Then a hooded head popped through the opening, making Gilderoy let go, shocked at the sudden entrance. Harry let out a strangled cry and barrled into the Death Eater, desperate to get out. He didn't care that the Death Eater would probably kill him. He just needed air! Harry toppled past the Death Eater and out of the vent, where a whole gang of them were waiting. Air! He could taste it, smell it, feel it again, but it didn't matter. One of the Death Eaters threw a large, black bag over him and zipped it up tight. Harry was trapped.  
  
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END OF CHAPTER TWO 


End file.
